June 26th-27th 2007 Brussels Commentary Employment Committee

26 June 2007

Brussels Commentary Employment Committee June 26th - 27th 2007 In my previous commentary I noted that my rejection amendment to the Portability of Pensions Directive had gone down heavily. This was an RCV and the print-out of votes is now available. In addition to UKIP, and all but 3 Ind-Dems, my 48 votes included a scattering across the political groups. Roger Helmer, Ashley Mote and Jim Allister supported, Kilroy abstained, but the remaining 57 British MEPs present all voted against. Not much further of note today, except that the committee debated Community Strategy on Health and Safety at Work. Now, with four experts attending and speaking, I thought this seemingly important debate would attract a big attendance. In the event the 33 members voting half an hour earlier dwindled to just five,- and that included the rapporteur, Glynis Willmott of the East Mids. Yesterday, Tuesday, was much more revealing. We were visited by Mr Muntefering the German Labour Minister, a last visit as the German Presidency ends. He met the coordinators for an informal discussion over lunch beforehand and I was interested to hear his comments on two directives. Apparently, the Council of Ministers are giving up on the Working Time Directive, its been too disruptive. Very good news for the UK. The Portability of Pensions Directive has also been very troublesome but Mr Muntefering thinks they can still make it work, even 'though he acknowledged that it had been sunk in Council by the Dutch veto. Strange, in the committee meeting 30 minutes later he said he knew nothing of the Dutch veto! At all events this dead directive is clearly going to receive the constitution treatment. Not so strange were Mr Muntefering's comments at the lunch about the German Presidency, which passes to Portugal on June 30th. They, the Germans, he proudly announced, are going to continue their wonderful work by 'helping' Portugal in their Presidency. Even better, they are to continue this altruistic effort by helping Slovenia, which follows Portugal. He then said that the two directives noted above were not necessarily dead and talked about a triple Presidency! So, did Muntefering mean 'help', or did he mean, 'exert a powerful influence' over two of the smaller countries, Portugal 10.5 million people and Slovenia 2 million, who only recently joined, in 1986 and 2004 respectively? After all, Angela Merkel openly stated that she would re-package the constitution with different terminology to get it through, and succeeded. Now they are going to 'help' Portugal and Slovenia,- and you can put the good news on hold! Derek Clark MEP Brussels June27th 2007